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Today we met up with our new friend Christine Brooks (whom we had originally met last week at the Vanves Flea Market) at the Les Halles RER Train Station in Paris.
She took us to a suburb called Chatou-Croissy about an hour outside Paris to this twice-a-year brocante (antiques) market where vendors come from all over France. Today was set-up day for the merchants, so there was no charge if you were a merchant. A business card of any kind gets you in. So Marty flashed his Traxxion Consulting card, and in we went. It was brocante as far as the eye could see - 700 stalls. We probably never would have known about this fair or found it on our own. WE HAD A BALL!!
Christine is so outgoing and talks to everyone, and knows lots of people there, so we felt very much at home, like when we used to go to markets like this when we lived here. Her friend Betsi came to meet us too, and of course Christine brought Mia, her 6-year old Golden Lab, so we were like a little family. Christine bought a fabulous 'boyfriend' style Yves St.Laurant tweed jacket from the '50s, and fell in love with a beautiful round marble-top table with ornate base and 4 velvet chairs, but she knew she did not have enough room for all that in her small rented flat.
Betsi, who has lived in Paris for 10 years, was bargaining for a beautiful French country farm table and a butcher block stand to have shipped to her new beach home in Rhode Island.
And Jill nearly bought a beautiful vintage Hermes Scarf, but she thought the colors were not right for her. Marty watched with amusement while holding on to Mia. We walked up and down the allees eating jambon et fromage mixte sandwiches with cornichons for lunch, although you could sit down at one of the restaurants in the market and have a full course proper French lunch. It started getting overcast and cold in the late afternoon, so we finally left at about 5pm when most stalls had closed down. Tomorrow the fair opens to the public for about a week. We are planning to go back on the last day with Christine when you can get the best bargains, but we may go back on our own before that because it was truly so much fun.
On the way home, since we had no reservations for dinner, Christine and Betsi told us of a fun restaurant that has a bar for wine and tapas that we should try called Frenchie. It's one of the hot new restaurants that I had read about and been told about, but it takes about a month to snag a res there, so you have to go to the bar across the narrow Rue du Nil. We walked from the Metro up a wonderful food market street called Rue Montorgeuil to Frenchie Bar and Restaurant. When we got there we spoke to Maive, the lovely hostess from California, and she said if she had a cancellation, she would get us from the bar across the street to come over for dinner in the restaurant.
Behold and low, a few minutes later Maive had a cancellation and found us hanging around the bar. So we decided to eat at the restaurant. It's very high end, with a New York tasting menu style and a great wine list. It wasn't exactly what we had in mind, but it was very good.
And as luck would have it, while Jill was talking to the chef at the open kitchen window, the lady at the table next to us, whom we knew was American (everyone in the place seemed to be American, why we didn't want to go there), turned to Marty and asked if I knew the chef. That of course started a night long conversation...we ended up leaving with them and will probably see them again before they leave for the States on Monday. We will definitely see them in NY where they have a pied a terre which they visit often from their home near Tampa where Raymond is a retired Urologist and Susan is a design architect.
And so another fabulous day ends!
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